A moving and meditative account of the crushing demands of Korean careerism.
In Jeong’s novel, a group of recent Korean college graduates navigate the unyielding competitiveness that permeates both professional and personal life.
Youngbaek Kim has much to be proud of—after he graduates from the prestigious Sky University, he lands a job at Corporation P, the second biggest company in Korea. However, he is plagued by discontent; he studied philosophy in college and feels stymied by the tediously banal routines of office life. Also, he constantly frets about money—it seems impossible that he will ever save enough to buy a home that others will be impressed by, and he fecklessly tries his hand at investment. His friends, Dongjoo Lee and Inyoung Choi, both seem much happier and much better positioned to win the endless rat race that dominates their lives. Dongjoo Lee is a programmer at the top corporation in Korea and handsomely compensated, while Inyoung Choi has a job in the civil service, a position coveted for its stability. However, they are both just as anxious about the future as Youngbaek, and as envious of him as he is of them. The author artfully depicts the Korean obsession with success and a society that strictly separates winners and losers through a process of “verification.” “Verification became a source of envy with everyone trying to take the successes of those around them and spin them as their own. It is high school all over again, with students using Photoshop to falsify their college entrance exam scores to receive verification from the community.” Youngbaek sees a chance at happiness when he becomes engaged to Jungyoon, a woman with whom he falls deeply in love—but her mother talks her out of it, convincing her that she and Youngbaek “just aren’t in the same league,” and that she can find someone with better financial prospects.
Jeong’s tale is impressively thoughtful—he reflects, with great clarity, on the ways in which Korea’s socioeconomic liberalization discarded one prohibitive hierarchy for another. As Youngbaek observes, “There are always more stairs to climb. Stairs upon stairs upon stairs...I guess Korea’s ancient class system of endless hierarchies, has really only changed in name. It will continue to loom over me and on to future generations. Still, climbing endless stairs is different from the impossibility of climbing up a family tree.” Friendships are almost necessarily converted into rivalries, and romantic connections are reduced to opportunities for social climbing, each date conducted in a metaphorical “interrogation room.” The author’s writing has a lapidary elegance to it—he subtly creates an atmosphere of melancholy and sad inevitability, as if there is no escape from the cultural pressures of Korean life. The plot moves at an unhurried pace, which can seem excessively languorous, and there is more than a touch of adolescent melodrama in Youngbaek’s tortured angst—a self-indulgent theatricality that borders on ponderousness. Still, Jeong’s depiction of Korean life, especially as experienced by its younger generation, is marvelously meticulous and rendered with great emotional power.
A moving and meditative account of the crushing demands of Korean careerism.Pub Date: Sept. 7, 2023
ISBN: 979-1198200242
Page Count: 226
Publisher: METRIC
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
This propulsive thriller twists into the dark and bloody underbelly of the world of fine art.
The discovery that a revered artist’s sculpture contains a human bone sets off scandal and violence.
Art historian James Becker has what seems like a sweet deal. He’s the curator of the collection of the Fairburn Foundation, housed at a stately home owned by the Lennox family: Sebastian, Becker’s best friend, and his bitter mother, Lady Emmeline. Becker’s wife, Helena, was Sebastian’s fiancee first, but they’re all very civilized about it and happily awaiting the birth of her baby. The centerpiece of the Fairburn collection is works by the late Vanessa Chapman, an artist about whom Becker wrote his thesis, and with whom he is somewhat obsessed. Partly, it’s because of her great talent, but she was also a glamorous figure, a beauty who, as she became successful, sequestered herself on an isolated Scottish tidal island called Eris. She had a dark side—lots of stormy relationships, plus a philandering mooch of a husband who vanished without a trace a few decades ago. Her reputation, though, has risen after her death—so much so that the Fairburn has loaned some of her works to the Tate Modern. That’s where a forensic anthropologist sees one of her sculptures, made of found objects that include what’s described as an animal bone. The scientist is sure the bone is human, and soon Becker finds himself scrambling to prevent scandal. Vanessa willed her works and papers to the foundation, but some of them are still on Eris, guarded by her longtime friend Grace Haswell. A retired doctor, Grace lived with Vanessa off and on over the years and nursed her through her fatal cancer. It was a surprise when Vanessa left her estate not to Grace but to Douglas Lennox, Emmeline’s husband and Sebastian’s father. Douglas was Vanessa’s gallerist and lover, but the two had a nasty falling-out. Sebastian is so frustrated by Grace’s refusal to turn over all of the bequest that he’s ready to sue her, but Becker believes he can negotiate, so off to the the island he goes. He finds far more treachery and shocking secrets than he expected, past and present alike. Hawkins keeps her cast tight, her wild setting ominous, and her plot moving fast.
This propulsive thriller twists into the dark and bloody underbelly of the world of fine art.Pub Date: Oct. 29, 2024
ISBN: 9780063396524
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Mariner Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
